E. Guigal Côte-Rôtie Brune et Blonde 1987 AOC 0,75l

The 1987 E. Guigal Côte-Rôtie Brune et Blonde is the red wine the Ampuis house makes from the appellation’s two historic slopes, Côte Brune and Côte Blonde, in a 75-centiliter bottle. Côte-Rôtie is the northernmost appellation in the Rhône Valley and produces only red wine, from vines on slopes reaching a 60% gradient, cultivated as far back as Roman times.

The house was founded in 1946, when Étienne Guigal, who had arrived in 1924, at the age of fourteen, at the Vidal-Fleury maison in Ampuis, decided to set up on his own. In 1961, when Étienne had by then lost his sight, leadership passed to his son Marcel. Under Marcel, the single-vineyard Côte-Rôties were created: La Mouline in 1966, La Landonne in 1978, La Turque in 1985. In 1984, the family took over Vidal-Fleury, and in 1995 bought the château in Ampuis, now the company’s headquarters.

Guigal combines traditional winemaking, with macerations of around three weeks, with long aging in wood. For Brune et Blonde, the house’s current fact sheet lists vines around 35 years old and 38 months in oak barrels, half of them new. These figures apply to recent vintages.

Côte Brune, upstream from the Reynard stream, has soils rich in iron oxides and is planted almost exclusively with Syrah, which produces powerful wines here. Côte Blonde, downstream, has schist and siliceous-calcareous soils and also includes Viognier, which lends finesse to the Syrah. According to legend, the lord of Ampuis gave these hills as dowries to his two daughters, one brunette and one blonde. Today, Guigal makes Brune et Blonde with 96% Syrah and 4% Viognier.

In the Rhône, 1987 was a rainy vintage, with a largely wet summer. In the north, dry weather returned in September and allowed the grapes to ripen; in Côte-Rôtie, harvest began on October 8, a week after Hermitage, and the appellation is remembered as the Rhône’s most successful area that vintage. After almost forty years in bottle, a Côte-Rôtie usually takes on garnet and orange hues, with finer tannins and notes of candied fruit, leather and undergrowth.

In Guigal’s range, Brune et Blonde is the house’s classic Côte-Rôtie, a blend from the two slopes, alongside the single-vineyard wines and, since 1995, Château d'Ampuis, which did not yet exist in 1987. The house recommends serving it at 16-18 °C, with red meat, game and aged cheeses.

In STELT's selection, this 1987 Brune et Blonde is the Côte-Rôtie for those who want to discover the Syrah of the northern Rhône after a long bottle age.

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